Into the Woods is my favorite piece of theatre ever created. It is a truly powerful, emotional story that weaves a number of themes—loss, grief, growing up, love—around the central idea of parenthood. I feel it’s 2014 film adaptation, for all its positive elements, ultimately failed when it took what is in many ways a narrative or parody and deconstruction, and changed the entire genre being deconstructed (going from a farsical riff on classical fairy tale iconography to a more vague, appropriately 2010s “dark fantasy” aesthetic.) This fancast imagines an ensemble of actors more in line with the comedic, musical aspects of the show.
